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Perhaps people should try meditation and exercise before going to the doctor demanding answers.
I understand that anxiety can be crippling for some, and understand the need for Rx in those cases, but I also think a lot people want pills and not take responsibility and take the effort to try and deal with things themselves.
I would take the patients to task before the pharmaceutical industry.
The issue is that many people do this to the point where the anxiety or other mental health issue is crippling because people like some of the people on this board stigmatize going to see a mental health professional so much that they are afraid of taking medicines or of going to see a mental health professional. I had one coworker who had anxiety attacks that were so bad that she stopped coming to work for a month. Her primary care doctor gave her a prescription for Atarax, but she never ended up addressing the real problem of the anxiety by seeing a psychiatrist or counselor and last I heard she needed to go into rehab for her alcohol addiction. She lost her job some time ago and I am not sure if she has had permanent jobs since then.
I have a friend who simply refuses to see a doctor about his mental health issues, although I think many of his health problems are related to stress. He doesn’t want to do anything *but* stuff like meditation (which doesn’t work for him) or exercise, but he is having problems that don’t seem to be anything that can be solved by doctors who don’t focus on mental health. I had a friend who had similar problems several years ago and she was told her symptoms were anxiety and stress after seeing tons of specialists and she had to get help to make a variety of lifestyle changes in addition to counseling and medication.
I suffer from anxiety and while you can absolutely take steps to help with it there are times when all the steps in the world don’t help. I have done everything from mindfulness meditation, yoga and supplements to exercising when I feel it coming on but sometimes you need a little extra help. I see a psychiatrist and take an anti-depressant and another med for anxiety but not a benzo or Xanax. I was firm about not wanting those and my psych agreed. She is well published and highly respected in her field and doesn’t go to meds as the first solution.
It’s easy to tell someone to just find a way to deal but there are times when you use every coping mechanism in the book and have done everything yet still feel anxious. There are also times when you need to meds to calm down enough to then use the coping mechanisms. I really don’t think you can fully understand unless you have an extreme anxiety disorder though as I know it took my husband years and coming to appointments with me to even begin to understand.
I mean ~ we all have our vices. Some people eat too many Cheetos to calm their anxiety. I take a half a klonopin a day to help me through the stress of my 50 hour a week job.
Perhaps people should try meditation and exercise before going to the doctor demanding answers.
I understand that anxiety can be crippling for some, and understand the need for Rx in those cases, but I also think a lot people want pills and not take responsibility and take the effort to try and deal with things themselves.
I would take the patients to task before the pharmaceutical industry.
I needed anxiety meds when I was going through a terrible family crisis and grief, but I also worked on trying to do without them by meditating, and other healthy coping strategies daily (swimming or biking daily,journaling, photography). I also kept in mind that the meds were addictive and was using them as needed
I have suffered from panic disorder since I was 28 to the point it was a daily struggle to go outside (agoraphobia). I had a career, so kept my panic disorder a secret because in the 1980s little was known about this "mental illness." I ended up in emergency rooms 21 times over a two-year period because I was sure I was having a heart attack each time. I found a psychiatrist out of Stanford University who was a pioneer in the disorder. Unfortunately, I picked up the fear of driving from other patients in group therapy sessions. While Valium calmed me down during an attack, I found Valium to cause depression and only used it for a week. Valium had a totally different effect from Xanax.
All of this background lead me to participate in clinical trials for Xanax. After 20-plus years of suffering, Xanax kept my panic attacks in check. To this day, I keep a supply in my purse as my safety net.
Over the years, my dosage went from .5 to 3.0 and there came a point I wanted to get off the pill dependence. I worked with my physician to gradually wean off the Xanax over a 14-month period (down to an occasional .25 only in emergencies). Getting off Xanax was very uncomfortable, including the feeling of jumping out of my skin. While I never want to go through withdrawal again, I am thankful for Xanax because it allowed me to function normally. Nothing else has ever worked.
Although Xanax has been abused for years by many and misprescribed (which I resent), the medication was made to address severe panic disorder. I am very thankful my use of Xanax is infrequent, but knowing I have a few .25 with me just in case has gone a long way toward diminishing the panic syndrome (behavior modification therapy was also a Godsend in getting it under control).
I have a dear friend in a similar situation. Like many patients she has explored every avenue to deal with it without meds, educated herself on all treatment options. It’s very hurtful ,damaging and part of a pattern of dismissing people with mental health challenges to infantalize them as uneducated about all their options and presume they look to doctors like daddies or gods.
I’ve heard the same tripe when I went through breast cancer as if I didn’t thoroughly research every angle of what type of breast cancer I had and the various treatment options and choose what I felt was the best approach while my life was on the line. Thank goodness I was not confined to traditional or non traditional approaches and was able to pick a wholistic team of traditional and non traditional.
The first thirty or forty years of TV we had no advertisements for alcohol or drugs. Advertisements for these dangerous substances is a relatively new concept. It also coincides with many of our problems spiking.
I have always felt that our doctors should prescribe. We sent them to medical school and they supposedly studied which medications are best for which conditions and they are supposed to keep up with advancements in their field.
When any pharmaceutical is advertised some patients will go to their doctors and demand that medication (regardless if the doctor feels the same way). So, regardless of the doctor's years of training and to make their patients happy, they give their patients what they want. To me it says they are not practicing medicine; they are trying out for a political career. However; there is always a chance the wrong medication might work simply because their patients believed (but not in all cases).
Regardless; I wish that Fifth Ave. never got involved in drug sales!
The first thirty or forty years of TV we had no advertisements for alcohol or drugs. Advertisements for these dangerous substances is a relatively new concept. It also coincides with many of our problems spiking.
I have always felt that our doctors should prescribe. We sent them to medical school and they supposedly studied which medications are best for which conditions and they are supposed to keep up with advancements in their field.
When any pharmaceutical is advertised some patients will go to their doctors and demand that medication (regardless if the doctor feels the same way). So, regardless of the doctor's years of training and to make their patients happy, they give their patients what they want. To me it says they are not practicing medicine; they are trying out for a political career. However; there is always a chance the wrong medication might work simply because their patients believed (but not in all cases).
Regardless; I wish that Fifth Ave. never got involved in drug sales!
The ads tell people to "Ask your doctor if "x" is right for you."
The ads suggest problems that don't even exist (new ad for Meningitis B, which says it can cause death) - the ad is targeted to parents of kids who are going off to college. It is very clever because it induces guilt and worry.
If doctors had backbones, they would have stopped this kind of advertising years ago.
Keep in mind too that these benzos are in the news as being connected to memory issues. When I heard that from a friend some years back, I stopped with the low dose lorazepam. I work with alternatives and there are many to look into.
Keep in mind too that these benzos are in the news as being connected to memory issues. When I heard that from a friend some years back, I stopped with the low dose lorazepam. I work with alternatives and there are many to look into.
My wife was prescribed Lorazepam and, after we read all the warnings, she never took one!
Keep in mind too that these benzos are in the news as being connected to memory issues. When I heard that from a friend some years back, I stopped with the low dose lorazepam. I work with alternatives and there are many to look into.
I have anxiety, and way-back-when was prescribed all kinds of things. Once I left a doctor's office with 5 prescriptions. Thank God I threw them all in the nearest trash can. Years later, going through a rough spell, was prescribed Xanax. Tried it. It did nothing for me (thank God) - threw it out (now-a-days, you can take unused meds to pharmacies to dispose of - there is a huge problem with water supplies being polluted by drugs - but that's another story).
My mother, whose care I supervised, was on all kinds of drugs . . . one of those was Valium. I have never taken Valium in my life (though I could get a prescription, "like that" - and I am sure it would "calm me down." But I KNOW that drugs are not the answer to MY problem).
I now have a host of things I do to deal with my sensitive nervous system. This morning I tapped in the shower - I also take vitamins and use essential oils and have a bunch of other healthy lifestyle things I use to cope with life on this planet.
Glad you also found what works for you.
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